tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post6425478846335218013..comments2018-01-19T12:58:55.582-05:00Comments on A Baking Life: the apples of my eyeTara Barkerhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/18166408630827421919noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-24142807158381878532010-09-30T16:48:59.314-04:002010-09-30T16:48:59.314-04:00Mr. Jackhonky - You&#39;re so right - you really D...Mr. Jackhonky - You&#39;re so right - you really DON&#39;T know anything different when you&#39;re growing up. Or even if you do, you still have to live wherever you find yourself, and (children especially) are inclined to make the most of it. But I do remember being a kid, and loving going to the &#39;big city&#39; of Portland to visit my grandparents. Here&#39;s a clue to how rural my upbringing was: pavement (on the road, on driveways, on sidewalks, etc.) seemed VERY fancy to me. I assumed it went hand-in-hand with wealth. ;) And then my cousins, who lived in a more urban (well, for Maine anyway) area, loved to come visit us in the summer because of the novelty of the country. I always found their enthusiasm amusing, and a bit mystifying. Ah, the perspective of childhood.<br /><br />And you&#39;re making a very strong case for SF, just so you know.Tara Barkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18166408630827421919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-59542932728711403982010-09-30T03:59:41.621-04:002010-09-30T03:59:41.621-04:00It&#39;s so funny. Having never grown up in a city...It&#39;s so funny. Having never grown up in a city OR a country (I was a suburb brat) I yearned for either. Either the country to go do exactly what you talk about, enjoy the sprawling nature, the fields of grass and the apples to pick OR the city where I could pound the pavement with my friends and visit the art galleries (I was an art fag, I WOULD have visited the galleries, trust me I would have), poetry readings and hung out at the coffee shops and run around generally enjoy everything the big city had to offer.<br /><br />But I had neither. And when I think about it, growing up in the suburbs was fine too. Sure I was bored by the lack of stuff to do, but that just forced me to do more with myself. My imagination grew wild with the adventures I would come up with in my backyard or in my basement. I would run around catching fireflies and listening to crickets at night and i would grumble and complain that there was nothing to do except read books. Loads and loads of books. And bake. I baked a lot of chocolate chip cookies and snickerdoodles.<br /><br />What I learned is that no matter what your childhood is, you don&#39;t know anything different. You enjoy it and make the best of what you have. It&#39;s easy to envy someone else&#39;s life in retrospect, but while your living it, you just don&#39;t know any better.<br /><br />In the end, I ended up living in a hybrid city. San Francisco isn&#39;t a big city like New York, all pavement and asphalt. But it has some of the best culture, best food and best city living that I can think of. Nor is it is the rural country. But apple picking is a couple hours away (I&#39;m going apple picking on Friday actually, and I&#39;ll probably use your recipe, because I have a habit of picking WAY too many apples when I go). The wine country is a couple hours away as well and Lake Tahoe with it hiking and it&#39;s amazing skiing is an easy weekend trip. You can drive over the bridge (or bike over the bridge) and be in Marin County cycling up a mountain, and you can go over the other bridge and eat at the world famous Chez Panisse (all in one day if you want) or visit all that Berkeley has to offer.<br /><br />And I&#39;m lucky that I live a mere block away from a park that people come from all over the city to, that is adjacent to an ice cream parlor, pizzeria, italian restaurant and french bakery that people travel from around the country to visit - a block that the New York Times once called &quot;The Gourmet Vatican.&quot; <br /><br />But sometimes, I do wish I had deciduous trees, I miss the changing leaves. I miss fireflies. I miss muggy nights and somehow, inexplicably, I miss the suburbs, a place I always wanted to escape from. It&#39;s mostly nostalgia. I know I&#39;ll never return to it. But it&#39;s part of me.Mr. Jackhonkyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00041384875905586173noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-27878986290034241582010-09-20T08:29:22.124-04:002010-09-20T08:29:22.124-04:00Thank you, Scarlett! I&#39;m so glad you enjoy it!...Thank you, Scarlett! I&#39;m so glad you enjoy it!Tara Barkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18166408630827421919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-66131853122733117412010-09-20T08:07:47.073-04:002010-09-20T08:07:47.073-04:00What gorgeous pictures! thank you-a lovely Blog!What gorgeous pictures! thank you-a lovely Blog!Scarletthttps://www.blogger.com/profile/09591663253768048175noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-68071922692701095952010-09-18T23:33:10.848-04:002010-09-18T23:33:10.848-04:00Yes, Britta, it&#39;s been interesting to realize ...Yes, Britta, it&#39;s been interesting to realize how much the lifestyle I would love for myself has almost nothing to do with the lifestyle I want for Kalen and Wylie, at least while they&#39;re little. And how willing I am to do everything I can to make sure they get what I believe they need, even if it means keeping me away from cities indefinitely! Ah, parenting. It sure makes you do crazy stuff!Tara Barkerhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/18166408630827421919noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-1961911981963687228.post-8384661584195348482010-09-18T20:17:55.293-04:002010-09-18T20:17:55.293-04:00I often wonder if I prefer to be a city mouse or a...I often wonder if I prefer to be a city mouse or a country mouse, but there is no doubt in my mind that I want my children to experience childhood as I did: living in a rural environment with plenty of exciting trips to the city. I too cherish the way we were raised and look forward to sharing with my children the traditions I learned growing up in rural Maine. -BrittaAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com